Longhand Typing

Music bounced around the room as I setup up the couch for Gaz to sleep on. It was late, the far side of midnight, and My Friend was in the kitchen making tea, talking about something I couldn’t hear as I stretched a blanket across the cushions. The hum of the immersion was faintly audible below the quiet melody I had playing on the speakers. Gaz having a shower before sleeping was my main point on a long list of stipulations.

I lived in an estate on the outskirts of town, within walking distance from the pub. It was characteristically bland, with not much decor beyond some paintings I once got out of a sense of necessity rather than interest.

“Almost done,” I called out to the kitchen. My Friend fired a loud grunt back in response.

As I entered the kitchen, Gaz was leaning close to My Friend, both staring at a phone.

“Could you turn down the music a bit, please?” My Friend asked. I turned it off entirely with my phone and plopped down in a chair across from them at the kitchen table. The sliding the door that lead to the garden framed the two intruders. I kept expecting the light, what I had decided was a physical manifestation of the song, to return, to explode in the sky that was just visible beyond the fence. The light was a by-product of the song, not the other way around. I believed this to be true. Wanted it to be true, for some reason. I took out my phone and scrolled through posts online about the light.

“Gaz thinks I’m crazy. Thinks you’re crazy,” My Friend said.

“So do I. I can’t find anything about the song online.”

“And you’re sure you heard it? You keep calling it a song, yeah? What did it sound like?”

The question bothered me. I knew I had heard it, said I had. Were they questioning their own certainty of this magical and absurd premonition they had?

I didn’t respond. I kept scrolling through posts online and rephrasing my searches in hopes to find other reports of people hearing the song.

“And you said what you heard was short, right? Then how was it a song?” This pissed me off enough to stop hiding my annoyance.

“Am I questioning your weird precognition? No. We’re sitting here in my home with some-” I stopped myself from aiming too much of my anger at Gaz. I had agreed to this, after all. “We’re in my kitchen,” I said, calmer, “And there is a stranger here, and I’m letting him stay the night because you’re too scared to bring him back to your home.” I put maybe too much venom on the last. Continued, “And you’re going to lecture me about what I know I heard. I’m as sure of what I heard as you are of what you say Gaz here is going to be able to do in, how long? Seven? Six hours?”

“You’re right, sorry. Yeah you’re right. I believe you.” The hum of the immersion was uncomfortably loud in the stark silence.

“Sorry?” Gaz said. Not a question, but inflected as such. As if he needed to placate my obvious anger somehow but couldn’t quite figure out a way.

I checked the time. Half an hour since I put the heating on. I told Gaz he could use the shower now and lead him down the skinny hall, up the stairs, and showed him the bathroom. When I returned to the kitchen, My Friend was frowning, phone in one hand, perpetually stirring a surely cold cup of tea with the other.

“I can’t find anything about this song online. Not saying I don’t believe you, but it’s not being talked about like the light.”

“I know,” I said, “I can’t either. It’s bothering me, I won’t lie. I don’t think I’m crazy but I’m beginning to feel it. Only a bit. I did hear it though. Or feel it? It’s hard to explain. What are you seeing people say?”

“Well people saw it in places where it’s still bright, or already is. The states, Australia. But there’s no videos of it. Well, there is, kinda. Look at this one, I’ve been saving posts.” They scrolled through their phone as they got up and rounded the table to sit beside me. The video was of someone dancing on a crowded street in what might have been New York. People passed, some smiling while others looked annoyed at the disturbance, when everyone in frame reacted. The girl dancing, no older than early twenties, hunched over and covered her head as if dodging an incoming projectile. Most other people flinched and stared up.

“See it?” My Friend said.

“No? Looked like they were reacting to a plane or something.”

“Yeah, right? I thought it was because it was still bright there. Even if it was evening, maybe you can’t see the light over the existing brightness of the sky. But no. I’ve seen several videos now all showing the, ehm, event? But none of them actually show the light that everyone agrees they saw. It’s not visible on camera, for some reason. Only the naked eye saw it, as far as I can tell right now.”

The buzz of the shower upstairs began. I sat in thought, staring out back, waiting for the light to return. It didn’t.

“I’ve got to call home, tell them I won’t be back tonight.”

“You’re staying too?” I said.

“Well yeah, obviously. I have to be here in the morning, in a few hours, for Gaz’s…” They paused, thought for a second, said, “Awakening?”

“Are we naming this thing now? I know you said you’re certain, but what if the morning comes and nothing happens? What are people calling it online? Not the mind reading thing, the light from earlier.” I asked.

“Many things. Most people are more in a ‘what the fuck’ mindset than an analysis mindset. I don’t know, it’s just…” A pause. They stood up and started pacing around the kitchen.

“It’s just, I can’t explain it but none of this is weird to me. I know Gaz is going to be reading minds and I know it’s related to the light. There’s no question, that’s just how it is. It’d be like you getting shocked when the sun rises tomorrow. Or waking up with arms surprised you, or something.”

“None of that would be shocking,” I said.

“Exactly. Not even a bit. You have to trust me on this. If tomorrow comes and nothing happens, you can send Gaz out back onto the street where it’s cold and damp where he might die of disease or violence. I’ll go back home looking like a fool and head off to work questioning reality. You can go off to work all smug, and that will be that. But just for tonight, just for now, please humour me. I gotta call home, back in a sec.”

They were lucky they had to call home because I was ready for another argument. It wasn’t the bringing Gaz back to mine or the crazy claims, or the hint that Gaz’s stay might be prolonged. It was the snide remark about sending Gaz back into the street. A part of me definitely was patting myself on the back for letting him stay the night, but My Friend had never shown interest in helping the poor or otherwise needy. Never talked about donating or volunteering. Gaz wasn’t staying in their home, he was staying in mine. I opened the door to him, and it barely took any convincing. But I was the bad guy for a hypothetical scenario where I went back to living how I always had without the intrusion. I didn’t think I was being altruistic, but a ‘thanks’ would go a long way.

My Friend argued into the phone in the hall. Their spouse never did quite like me, I had always thought, but I was trusted, and they knew it was safe here. I had even babysat their children on a few occasions.

“I know it was strange but Fionn fell and has a bunch of glass in his face, I think I should stay to…I know but it’s fine now and I don’t think it…yeah, I know…yeah, I will…After work, I promise. Earlier than usual…Promise…Love you.” And then a loud curse, which I assumed came after hanging up.

They trudged back into the room, grabbed the cup of tea, took a sip and spat it back out.

“Cold?”

“Apparently, yeah, I am. Oh the tea? Yeah, freezing.”

“You could have come up with a better lie. About the whole-” I waved my hand across my cheek. “Not a scratch here. And you’re all sparkly, still.”

“Fuck, I know. Am I though? Sparkling?” They picked up their phone and used it as a makeshift mirror.

“No, we got it all. But you’re all cut up. How you going to explain that?”

Before they could answer, the sound of the shower cut off and heavy footsteps pounded across the ceiling above us. We sat in silence as the bathroom door opened and Gaz made his way back down the stairs after his incredibly brief shower. Irregular and uneven steps. He was beaming when he entered the kitchen. Long grey hair slicked back, beard dripping onto the linoleum floor.

“I owe the two of youse my life. D’you know how long it’s been since I had a shower? Got anything to drink?”
Neither of us responded, only shared a look I can only assume was mutually understood: Do we really want him to get more drunk than he already is?

I settled on placating him with a small glass of whiskey. He had sat back down beside My Friend and was leaning in, trying to read the phone screen. They read out something from their screen.

“Alien light illuminates sky globally”

“You can read those tiny words? And you really aren’t fuckin’ with me? Sayin’ I can read minds? ‘Cause of this light? Need another glass before I believe that.” He paused with arms outstretched either side. My Friend had to lean back to avoid receiving a backhand to the face. “Or ten,” he almost shouted.

“I said will, not can. In another six hours and forty minutes, probably.”

I noted the specificity of the stated time.

“Well either way I’m just happy to have had a shower. Clean my toes. And thanks for letting me use your toothbrush, ehm…”

“Fionn,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose, trying not to show the anger I felt. I hadn’t said anything about a toothbrush. My Friend must have understood my frustration because they read out something else.

“I saw the light and it was like a sword in the sky”

“Sword?” I said. “What I saw was just a circle, really. Flashed a few times. I missed the first flash but saw the rest when I looked up.”

“Well this person in…Perth? I think? Said it was like a line in the sky”

“I didn’t see shit.” Gaz added, my sympathy for him dwindling with each contribution.

“You were passed out. You would have seen it if you were awake. And if I’m right about you being able to read minds in six hours and thirty eight minutes we’ll let you stay here a bit longer, figure this out.” They winced as they said it, no doubt knowing the glare I sent their way.

“What if I read your mind right now? You’re thinkin’ of…” He had a constipated squint on his face. “No, nothin’.”

A long uncomfortable silence followed. Probably just to break it up, My Friend read another comment from their phone.

“I’m blind and I saw the light? Should I see a doctor? Am I going to get my vision back?”